The kitchen is often thought of as the most important piece of real estate in most homes. The square footage of counterspace is, for purposes of measuring the practical utility of a kitchen for food preparation, a fairly reliable measure of the desirability of a particular kitchen and homes may even be bought and sold depending on the amount and quality of counterspace in their kitchens. Therefore, as more and more countertop conveniences have been added to culinary arsenals, greater consideration has been given to ways to save this valuable commodity for the cook of the house. As evidenced by the relatively recent proliferation of appliances designed to be mounted under kitchen cabinets, appliances which hitherto occupied countertop space,, manufacturer's have become acutely aware that saving kitchen space can be a customer's overriding concern when considering the purchase of kitchenware, kitchen appliances or related tools.
Another consideration which has been recognized as having value to a customer of housewares of all sorts, and particularly in kitchenware, is that of a contrivance being operable in a manner which frees one or both of the user's hands for other tasks or otherwise increases the efficiency of the user in their task.
Consider the following typical hypothetical example of a cook using a conventional chopping board, usually constructed from a rigid piece of wood, acrylic plastic or nylon. In most cases, the board is a relatively heavy object, to prevent shattering from being hammered or chopped at with a knife or chopper. Additionally, consider that the board must be set on an even surface of some sort, most often a kitchen countertop or nearby tabletop. After the food is chopped, using a knife or other chopping or slicing tool, it must then be transferred to the pot or pan in which it will be further processed or into a bowl for serving. In the instance where a cook already has a pot or pan warming on a stove-top or in an oven, the cook must either transfer the food into an intermediary transport vessel for transport to the oven area, or physically lift the heavy board, carry it over to the stove area, properly position the pot, pan or open the oven door and while controlling the heavily laden board with one hand, carefully slide the chopped food into the pot or pan with the other hand, more often than not spilling some of the food onto the floor, under the stove burners or onto the oven floor. This highly inefficient and cumbersome procedure can be potentially exhausting and certainly creates more work. But it does not end there.
Still maintaining control of the now-dirty board or worse yet quickly scurrying to find a place to set it down, the cook must replace the pot or pan lid or replace the roasting pan into the oven and close the oven. Then the board must be transported back to sink, move aside any dishes and utensils with which the sink is already filled, and immediately clean the board, thereby reclaiming the countertop space which was occupied, finally, storing the board away in a cabinet.
The final step, that of cleaning, can never be underestimated with respect to any reusable food preparation utensil. Unfortunately, it is known that many cutting boards, almost no matter how vigorously scrubbed, often retain some food residues, especially when used frequently and once the surface is heavily scored. Their continued use can eventually cause food poisoning or other illnesses. This disadvantage is suffered by wood-surfaced cutting boards in particular, and in some small manner by nylon cutting boards. While glass or ceramic cutting boards do not suffer from this particular disadvantage, they have the additional problems of extreme weight and they have the potential of shattering when dropped or struck hard or, worse yet, of chipping and leaving sharp bits in the food being prepared. Additionally, repetitive cutting on glass cutting boards tends to accelerate dulling of the knife being used.
Although materials such as high density polyethylene, nylon and acrylic are less susceptible to the afore-mentioned disadvantages, nylon boards do become worn and stained, developing a most unappetizing appearance over a period of time, sometimes after as few as 100-200 uses. The cost of a board of average thickness (usually in the range of from 3/8 inches to 3/4 inches) constructed from these materials to the consumer is often in the range of from $8-$15 retail, and they still suffer from the disadvantages previously mentioned.
One known cutting board attempts to address the issue of space and also provides means for drainage of liquids therefrom by providing a cutting board of wood which has extendible wire supports for maintaining the board in a suspended position above a sink. The board, rather than having a continuous surface, is provided with an area where a wire grid forms the surface of the board. In use, a cook cuts fish or some other food and shoves it temporarily onto the surface of the grid where it can drip or drain directly into the sink below. However, the size of this board is necessarily large, on the order of 12 to 18 inches in length, and the food must still be transferred to its final destination by one of above-described methods, i.e. piecemeal, by an intermediary bowl or by lifting the entire board off the sink and over to the other bowl or to the stove. The other disadvantages mentioned above are not even addressed by this known cutting board.
Another known board is provided with a hole through one portion thereof. The board is simply placed across a sink and food is chopped thereon and pushed through the hole to fall into a bowl or pot placed into the sink below, that is assuming the bowl or pot is positioned exactly underneath the hole. This cutting board simply transfers the space burden from the countertop to the sink bottom. Prior to its use, the cook must either empty the sink to provide space on which to rest the bowl or at least the sink's contents must be rearranged. However, this method introduces new health risks into food preparation since food is now more likely than before to come into contact with the unsanitary surfaces and contents of the sink.